If they can’t find anyone to move in with them but are now sinking another $300k into the place, I’m just scratching my head. This really doesn’t make sense to me at all. They could save and invest their money so they could afford to have care in their home or stay in a CCRC.
Where will they get funds to pay off their $300k loan?
Holy cow! So they’re spending the equivalent of a whole extra house for that. Dang.
My personal preference for ‘aging in place’ would be:
To me personally, “downsizing” does NOT equal “I’m going from 4000 sq ft to 3000 sq ft” because 3000 sq ft is still an awful lot of space for 1-2 people. I don’t want a bunch of my retirement money to be tied up in a large house. Plus, as one ages, maintaining a large home can become challenging.
My dad, for example, is in a 2800 sq ft house that sits on 1 acre. It’s just him and his wife living there. They don’t have large get-togethers there. Nobody ever goes to visit there. It’s just the 2 of them in this big house. I really wish that he’d move into a retirement home of some sort because he’d get a lot more socialization than he does not. But he’s a stubborn 80 yr old who refuses to change. And there’s nothing we can do about it.
We have 1250 sq ft one story home. We have tiny bathrooms. To enlarge them world steal space from adjoining rooms or change footprint of home. We have 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms. Our doorways are narrow for wheelchairs or walkers but otherwise house is fine.
D’s friend is an OT and slept over at our home while we were away. She told D, “Wow, your folks’ home is pretty well set up for aging in place.” D was happy she said that.
Our neighborhood isn’t “walkable” in terms of being able to walk to stores & medical care. When we need that, we can move to our condo.
I’m not sure it’s the choice I’d make but at $168,000 per year (the $84k is per person) they’d spend that in less than two years of assisted living. Presumably the house is worth a ton, and obviously they have at least $300k in equity so even if they just pay interest each year (someone in the comments estimated that at $24k per year) and the loan gets paid off after they sell the house they are ahead of the game. Again not saying I’d choose that - can you imagine overseeing a major renovation in your 80’s? But I can see why they think it makes sense.
Personally, I find “too much house” onerous. If they live with woods in their backyard, that sounds like they may not live close to healthcare and maybe live in a car-dependent location. As they age, they may need more driving services to get where they need to go—shopping, healthcare, groceries, dining. $300K is a lot of money—sounds like they thought it through as best they could and are satisfied with their choice. Personally, I’d not want to take on that kind of debt at this point in our lives. We haven’t added any debt since we paid of our mortgage and kids’ ed expenses over a decade ago, when H retired. We have no appetite for debt, but of course I hope it works for them as they are anticipating.
I have no skin in this game but this couple didn’t need assisted living at this point. They could have gone into independent living.
My mom’s IL apartment was $4100 a month in what I would assume was a similar cost of living city as Rochester. That included everything, utilities, a cleaning service, meals, cable. Lots of activities. I can’t remember what the charge was for the second person but it was less.
Much less than $84,000 for assisted living. My mom never needed AL. This couple is in good physical shape now.
They want to age in place. If they can sink $300,000 on an addition, the house has equity. I will assume that they are drawing social security and have other income streams because they are going to have a hefty mortgage payment.
The math isn’t mathing. My opinion is that dismissing the other options are excuses because they don’t want to make other plans.
I have my own parent in law who wants to do what they want to do. They are resisting moving. They have other excuses that don’t make a ton of sense. All of their aging in place plans they pay out of savings and the costs are way less than $300,000. But that’s where we are.
Thanks for the gift link!
Their children didn’t want to/couldn’t help, but were okay with essentially handing the house over to the bank at some point?
I think it’s wise to plan for one floor, to move a laundry room, to add railings – but wow, such a big loan.
My mom can barely use a conventional phone. My inlaws are unable to text or use the internet effectively, and think cell phones are only for emergency calls. Can’t videochat. Can’t navigate a website – and the author thinks they’ll use a self driving car? Or Uber?
Re: the WSJ article linked above, the article says that the homeowners did the design of the master suite addition themselves using software. 
I don’t know about you guys, but if I were in the market to buy a house in Rochester, NY that had a huge addition designed by a bored retiree, I’d totally pass on that house.
The retired couple featured in that story are, in my opinion, being very unrealistic. It’ll be fine…until it isn’t fine.
This is so sad. And so real.
We really love our house. It doesn’t have a bedroom on the first floor. It is not in a walkable neighborhood for anything but our very pretty lake. We have to drive everywhere.
It’s not exactly an aging in place house. But as long as it works for us, we will stay here. We both know that if the other spouse dies, the house will go immediately. If we need to move elsewhere because we can’t manage or afford or whatever this house, we will sell and move.
We I’ll not spend $300,000 to redo this house. But I would love to redo the two upstairs bathrooms!
I’m a little surprised that people are commenting on walkability - which I’m a fan of….but why is walkability a factor in aging in place? If you can’t drive due to your physical/mental condition…can you really be walking a handful of blocks to buy and carry home a bag of groceries?
That would be so awful on pretty much every level. I’m sorry for all the caregivers who have to deal with this. It must be so brutal!
Walkability helps give you purpose for moving around and perhaps helps keep you fit longer. At least that’s my thought.
Stores and medical
Facilities were two things mentioned above - in fact by you!
Of course exercise is good, the sense was that these potential older people needed walkability to complete errands. I would think things would have to be quite close - unless the aging in place is happening quite early in elderly life
My grandparents lived independently until my grandfather was 92 because they could walk to the market, church and the bank. They could also get the bus to take them to their doctor’s appointment. They would not have managed with glaucoma and vision issues if they had to rely on driving.
I guess I would be a little concerned about the walking too much if a distance with vision issues as well.
Or for the errands to be REALLY close - which can be hard to make happen!
I do applaud the independence and though!
For the condo, the health food store is literally right outside the lobby. The rail is being built less than a block from the lobby. There is a pedestrian mall outside the lobby as well. That’s very different from on our home in the suburbs where you pretty much need a car to go most places.